Reading

Go, and do thou likewise. The New York Times, writes Jamison Foser after years of reading “is, politically, a Republican newspaper.” Okay, so I’m on a rant about the media’s obsession with Biden’s age. Thankfully, Jamison Foser offers suggestions on how to do more than complain or suggest, as lefties regularly do, that the left build its own media platforms. (In the next few months?) Foser writes at his substack, Finding Gravity: First, it is important to note that there is a difference between acknowledging that the Times and its ilk won’t change much in response to criticism and thinking they won’t change at all. Forceful, reasoned media critiques can shift behavior around the margins — a little more coverage of something that’s been underplayed, a little less of something over-played, a reconsideration of a unsupported assumption or an underlying bias. It isn’t particularly efficient, it isn’t going to lead to the wholesale changes it should, but in a closely-divided country changes at the margins can be decisive.

Once Upon A Time there was an ant. She spent all her days carrying food and building supplies to the nest, following scent trails laid down by other worker ants.

Nothing she did was different from what other worker ants did.

One day she looked to the sky and screamed, “I matter.”

Every day after she would look at the sky for a few moments. She never again said “I matter.”

Once, when she was looking at the sky, another worker ant came up to her and gently touched her antennas.

She followed that ant when it left, and together they foraged food and picked up leaves.

One summer eve, some earth crumbled and the other ant, tumbled down and fell on her back. It took a lot of pushing to help her back to her feet, but when it was done the ant felt a great rush of relief and happiness, like nothing she had felt before.

If you’ve studied game theory, you’ve probably come across the mixed-motive coordination game, a simple one-shot game in which two representative actors have to figure out how to coordinate so as to find a mutually beneficial equilibrium – but have different interests over which equilibrium they choose. And if you studied it a couple of […]

When COVID struck Rebecca Saltzman’s family, the virus unmasked a life-changing discovery: her husband and two of their kids had genetic heart disease. The kind where people drop dead. As their healthy wife and mother, Saltzman had a new role too—guiding her family through what Susan Sontag called the Kingdom of the Sick. In this column, she’ll explore the anthropological strangeness of this new place, the mysteries of the body, and how facing death distills life into its purest form: funny, terrifying, and sublime.

Read Part I.

That’s no light at the end of the tunnel. It’s a train. We’ve seen this movie. We watched it in 2016. The press, driven by capitalist imperative to sell newspapers and attract eyeballs, promoted every right-wing smear against Hillary Clinton’s campaign for president, most importantly the faux scandal about her private email server. Clinton was likely the most qualified presidential person Democrats have ever fielded for the presidency. To win the presidency, Clinton first had to be an excellent candidate. She was not that, nor was her campaign up to the job. (Don’t get me started.) Nevertheless, the race to defeat Donald Trump, the TV celebrity and failed casino operator, was close. Her campaign suffered death by a thousand media cuts, flogged by right-wing outlets and in the eleventh-hour by grandstanding of FBI Director Jim Comey. It’s happening again with the stream of media attention to President Joe Biden’s age. Republican’s all-but nominee Trump is only three years younger and in obvious cognitive decline.

Use to discuss topics unrelated to recent posts.

1. Will Reba McEntire end the National Anthem by calling for a ceasefire? YES

2. Will the team kicking off first use a holder who will yank the ball away from the kicker at the last second to honor the eve of the twenty-fourth anniversary of Charles M. Schulz’s death? YES

3. Will my wife cry at the Dove commercial? NO

4. Will I cry at the Carl Weathers commercial… and the Dove commercial? NO

5. Will Usher’s “ABC Song” from Sesame Street be part of the halftime show? YES

6. Will Joe Alwyn suit up for the 49ers in a last-ditch attempt to win her back? YES

7. Will the Roman numerals be changed to binary for Super Bowl 111010? YES

8. Will the first serious injury occur in an identical manner to when I try to stand up from the couch too quickly? NO

Writer and investigative journalist Matt Kennard joins Lowkey to discuss Britain's secret military support for Israel.

The post How Britain is Helping Israel to Bomb Gaza, with Matt Kennard appeared first on MintPress News.

Ministers' failure to properly monitor nitrogen pollution in our waterways is effectively encouraging further breaches of environmental law by farmers and big business, reports Thomas Perrett

A new investigation by the BBC has revealed a shocking incident in which Thames Valley Police officers made “sickening” comments about a woman, filmed semi-naked with police body-worn video cameras. The woman was being filmed when her body became exposed while suffering a seizure. Later that shift, officers watched the footage, making degrading comments about […]

The daily grind of non-playable characters offers a clever critique of capitalism’s ‘infinite loop of labour performance’

- by Aeon Video

Watch at Aeon

As a republican, Sophie de Grouchy argued that sympathy, not domination, must be the glue that holds society together

- by Sandrine Bergès & Eric Schliesser

Read at Aeon

With its origins in 16th-century India, Bharathanatyam remains hugely popular. Here’s a primer to kickstart your enjoyment

- by Lakshmi Thiagarajan

Read at Psyche

While rent-control policies can mean more affordable housing for some, research shows they can also lead to a decline in the supply and quality of rental housing.

This year we need your help to follow the money, call out corrupt campaigning, and monitor voter suppression wherever it occurs

Every one of us will experience illness, damage, impairment, disability and, inevitably, old age, writes Penny Pepper

"Something worth noting (and may not be readily apparent): Yang Hengjun is an Australian citizen. But to the Chinese government, he's Chinese."

It was interesting to spend a few weeks in London recently and catch up with friends and research colleagues. It always focuses the mind on issues when one is in situ rather than gazing at data and reports from afar. My view of British Labour as being incapable of providing the British people with a…